


Girl Meets Self

by evrythingo_kay



Category: Girl Meets World
Genre: Canon Divergent, F/M, lucaya!!!!!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-02
Packaged: 2020-09-27 08:09:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20404462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evrythingo_kay/pseuds/evrythingo_kay
Summary: ”Would you stop calling me Lucas?”Somewhat breathless, Maya has to blink a few times before she can respond.“I thought you liked it when I called you Lucas.””Only when it’s special.””It never isn’t.””I might kiss you.”





	1. Bay Window

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea how long this is gonna end up being... enjoy!!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maya and Riley come back from a search to find true Maya only to discover Lucas, Zay, and Farkle waiting for them in the bay window.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is actually a scene from the show (3x06) but I modified it to what I thought should've happened.

Maya crawls through the infamous bay window with Riley hot on her tail and purple paint cracking on her face, only to lock eyes with Lucas Friar himself.

Zay is saying something that completely surpasses her ears as she flops down on the seat beside Huckleberry and Riley follows suit. 

“Where were you guys?” Farkle asks from the corner of Riley’s room. 

“Roadtrip.” Riley responds. “We went looking for Maya.” 

“Oh,” Lucas chimes in from beside her. “Did you find her?”

Well, Maya does feel kind of refreshed. And warm. It feels good to be sitting in the window that feels the most like home to her than any other place on earth with her best friend, who she presently feels more love for and connected to than ever. And she’ll be damned if she isn’t going to pummel this triangle to dust and there isn’t a time better than this to do it. When they’re all here, like always. Like it should be. 

For old times sake, she grabs a fist-full of Lucas’ shirt and pulls him close.

“You make a decision about us, Ranger Rick?” 

“I did.” He replies, clearly trying to be passive, but doing a terrible job of hiding his amusement. 

“Yeah? Well it doesn’t matter.”

Her friends, as expected, don’t like this one bit. 

“Yeah it does!” Farkle exclaims.

“Yeah, we’ve been waiting for like two years.” Zay agrees, sounding totally put out. 

“No,” Maya objects, trying to make her friends see. “It doesn’t matter because,” she says turning to Lucas, “you picked Riley.” 

Lucas’ eyes search hers, but they give nothing away. If anything they seem to be looking for answers that she doesn’t even really have, when Riley gasps. 

“What! How do you know? Yaaaay!” The brunette celebrates, going to cradle Maya in her arms before Lucas can successfully figure her out. “Oh, I’m so sorry, Maya—YAAAY!”

Maya loves her more and more by the second, she decides. She just can’t help it. It’s Riley-syndrome. 

It lets her know that they’ll always be okay, no matter what. 

She turns back to Lucas. 

“Because no matter who you picked, you picked Riley. You pick her, you got Riley. You pick me, you got Riley because that’s who I’ve been lately.” Maya explains to Lucas’ unreadable expression. 

She waits for him to tell her she’s right, to choose Riley then and there, case closed, we can all go home, but… he surprises her yet again. She hates when he does that. 

“What do you wanna do?” Lucas asks seriously, like the good, considerate, responsible samaritan that he is. 

He’s looking at just her, like it’s solely her decision to make, and it’s the look that he reserves only for her: kind of broody in a way that only a cowboy could be, maybe trying to figure her out, but kind nonetheless. Patient. 

She doesn’t even have to think before she answers. 

“I want out.” 

She says it simply, shrugging, even though she knows that’s not fair. She can’t help it. She’s Maya again and she finally knows who that is now. 

“You want… out.” Farkle repeats. 

“What does that even mean?” Zay asks. 

“It means,” She says with a sigh, “that I’m out. I’m out of the triangle.”

”You can’t do that!” Zay protests, but then, seeming to grow wary, looks to the rest of the triangle. “Can she do that?” 

Riley and Lucas, however, are looking at her equally perplexed and bereft of an answer, so she barrels on.

“I need you guys as friends." She says, briefly looking at each of them. "That’s something that I never want to change, and I’ve been so confused lately that it was hard to tell up from down, let alone figure out my… feelings.”

She doesn’t purposefully say that word with a shudder. 

“So what are you saying?” Lucas asks, drawing all attention back to him.

And there’s that look again. The _Maya_ look. It's completely different to the way his eyes soften or light up when Riley does something super goofy and just so utterly _Riley_. No, Maya Hart puts a furrow between his brows, makes him think too much, keeps him guessing. Whatever feelings Lucas may think he has for her, she knows this is for the best. 

“I’m saying that you’re a great friend, Lucas. We’ll always be great friends. I just think that… that’s all we are.”

She searches his eyes now, not really sure what she’s hoping to find. In the end, he doesn’t say a thing, but gives a small nod and a tiny smile that makes Maya think that everything is going to be just fine. 

Farkle and Zay come to join them, the other three scooting over to make room and as the five of them sit there, soaking up another long night, it seems that they’ve come to a silent agreement that, yeah, everything is going to be just fine.


	2. Ski Lodge Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sooooo I didn't know if I was gonna post this one, but.... eh what the heck. here's some triangle angst for ya.

The triangle died weeks ago and everything has been going pretty much perfectly fine. Somehow, the gang slips right back into their regular routine and leaves that trainwreck in their dust. 

Slight things have changed, of course. Things that are to be expected. Like, whenever they go to hang out at Topanga’s, Riley and Lucas always end up glued to each other’s sides. Oh, and maybe the moon eyes from Riley and fond smiles from Lucas are somewhat more frequent, but it’s nothing barf-inducing. 

So everything’s going fine, the gang is at harmony once again, and nothing about the horrid triangle should ever _ever_ have to be hashed up again. 

Except, Maya can’t help but be exasperated as she watches Lucas’ back as he stalks towards the door of the ski lodge, with Farkle, Smackle, Zay, and herself hot on his tail.

Riley is sitting at the bay window where they left her before the nature walk with the same serene look in her big brown eyes despite the gigantic boot on her foot. 

“How did it go?” She asks as Maya comes to a halt right by her side. 

“Just like you’d think.” Lucas replies, looking like he wants to pace, but miraculously refraining. “Farkle wandered off the trail and _Maya_ broke the rules to go after him.” 

The disapproval in his tone must completely surpass Riley’s ears as she smiles at Maya and gets to her feet. 

“You broke the rules?” Riley asks her hopefully. 

Maya returns the brunette’s smile in stride and nods. 

If all it takes is a few bent rules to return the universe to its natural balance, then Maya will gladly deliver every time. 

It’s now seeming like it’ll come with a cost, though, and that cost is apparently Lucas Friar’s sanity, of all things. 

“Yeah, she always breaks the rules, but this time she could’ve been killed.” Lucas butts in, crossing his arms over his chest and _what does he think he's doing towering over her like that_. Looking into her eyes like that? He's wound up tight for no reason; in fact, Maya can practically see his marbles falling out of his ears. 

“It’s like you never know when to stop.” Lucas continues on his tirade. 

“Farkle.” Maya beckons, starting to get exasperated herself. 

Anyway, she figures Farkle will defend her given that she just nearly fell off of a cliff to save his life. But she'd only done it before Lucas could do it himself. Hell, hadn’t he shown them time and time again that he reverts back to Texas Lucas with ease the instant one of his friends is in trouble? 

So why oh why is he giving her so much heat for saving their friend’s life?

While Farkle gives a very animated explanation of what went down on the hike, Lucas, Smackle, and Zay chime in with their two cents. In short, Lucas tried to go after Maya who went after Farkle who was chasing a moth of all things, only for Smackle to practically jump into Lucas' arms, thwarting his hero complex from springing him into action. Smackle had clung hilariously to him until Maya managed to haul Farkle back over the cliff he was dangling from. And Zay provided unhelpful commentary and nothing else. 

It was a disaster that ended in extremely high praise from Farkle, and even a few proposals that Maya would prefer to forget. Lucas, however, had stalked all the way back down the mountain without even sparing Maya a glance, with the exception of the brief moment he took when she first got up to make sure she was okay. 

And now, Lucas’ expression hasn’t lightened up much since.

Maya waits for their friends to finish the extremely exaggerated run-down of the tale and then playfully nudges his arm.

“_Come on_, Lone Star, you’re not really mad at me. You like it when we tangle.” She gibes. “It’s what you like about me, you just don’t wanna admit it.”

The words simply slip past her lips, effortless, as she's unbeknownst to the avalanche they'll cause. 

“No, it’s not, Maya.” Lucas contends firmly. 

There's a brief pause where their eyes lock, and his own soften just the tiniest bit that she thinks her’s might be playing tricks on her.

“At least, I don’t think it is.”

And Maya Hart is officially at a loss because there’s that look again. The one where he himself doesn’t know if he wants to yell at Maya or... 

She doesn't know what else. All she knows is that it’s completely reserved for her.

Her face burns under the weight of it, and unfortunately all of their friends are there to witness her freeze. 

But she thinks maybe they're all silently doing exactly what she's doing: trying to figure out in what way the word "like" is being used here. Maya isn't even sure herself; she didn't really think. She doesn't _think_ when it comes to Lucas. Maybe that's why he's so mad at her all the time. 

Lucas, harder to read than ever, drops maya’s gaze, and she makes the fatal mistake of looking to Riley first, who looks like her feet have been hammered to the floor. 

Seemingly sensing danger in that instant, Zay, Smackle, and Farkle shuffle aimlessly away in the most unnatural way possible. 

Maya can’t really blame them. 

Especially when Riley turns away and hobbles wordlessly towards the bay window seat. 

Maya and Lucas' gazes collide for just a nanosecond.

And for some reason, they both walk to the bay window and take a seat on either side of Riley. And that reason is Riley herself. It’s as simple as that. Lucas and Maya are both long standing residents of Rileytown. 

So they watch as the brunette pulls a leaf out of her pocket, brilliantly red and similar to the ones hanging off of the trees just outside of the window. And Maya and Lucas wait, hanging onto every word that she hasn’t yet said. 

“You okay?” Lucas finally breaks the unbearable silence, voice light and nods to the leaf. “What’s that?”

So Riley explains the origin of the leaf, how it fell into her lap, and because of this, due to whatever flowery, Riley logic that’s floating around in her head, the leaf means that yes she is okay and so will be everything else. 

“You’re always such a romantic.” Lucas muses, and there goes the fond smile.

Followed by doe eyes. 

And this is where Maya decides she needs to leave, maybe go scope out the food situation in this lodge, figure out what chaperone duties Josh has during this time of day. Cause maybe she misinterpreted her need to be sitting at this window with them at all. 

Of course, she’s reeled right back to Earth the second she hears Riley say: 

“This triangle has to die right now.” 

“_Riley_.” Maya warns.

“Maya, I know what you said about wanting out.” 

“Okay, so can we please—”

“But I don’t need you to hide your feelings from me in order to protect my own.” Riley says, her eyes pleading for Maya not to drift away like her expression must say she wants to. 

So Maya stays put. Not because she thinks the brunette’s right, but just because she wants her to. That’s how their friendship works. 

“Do you really think that there is any scenario where I would do something that's hurting you? Even if you were too selfless to say something?” Riley asks her best friend. 

“Riley... ” 

“And Lucas,” Riley says, swiveling on the seat to face the frowning boy. “I know this is a lot. For all of us. And I know you've felt this whole time like the pressure is on you, but it's not. It's on all of us. And I also think you have feelings for Maya.”

“Riley—”

Maya is almost glad Riley cuts him off. Almost.

“Lucas, I've been able to read you from day one and I know what I see. And what I see is that you’re mad at maya for going after Farkle. But not because she broke the rules. If the choice were up to you, you would have done the same thing. I know you would’ve. But Maya beat you to it and… thank god she didn’t get hurt.” Riley spares a quick glance at her best friend, who feels like she’s swallowed her tongue. 

She can’t begin to prepare herself for her best friend’s next words. 

“You’re angry, Lucas, because you care.” Riley says. Like it’s simple. Like it won’t be the end of them. “Just like Maya was angry at you for riding tombstone.”

And this is the moment Maya knows. This will be the end of them. Especially when neither of them, Maya or Lucas, can seem to come up with something useful to say. 

They just watch Riley's hands as she fiddles with the bright red leaf in her palm as her speech dies off.

And for a while, there’s nothing but silence. 

Maya can’t look at Lucas and she sure as hell can’t look at Riley anymore. So she directs her gaze out of the window.

Lucas stares ahead.

Riley, sat between them, caresses her leaf.

Maybe they’ll stay like this forever.


	3. Ski Lodge Part 2

"Riley!” Maya yells over her best friend’s voice.

“_Lalalalalalalalalalalala_!” Riley shouts, covering her ears just to be safe as the blonde tries to break through the invisible barrier that seems to be separating the two. 

“Riley, stop!”

“Lalalala.”

“_Riley_. Why would you do this?” 

“_Because_, Maya.” Riley exclaims, finally dropping the antics to throw her arms in the air. “You wouldn’t do anything. So I did. _I_ did. And if that makes me the bad guy, then fine.”

Riley shrugs, aiming for nonchalance. Except, this is _Riley_, she couldn't be nonchalant if someone banged her in the head with a pot full of it. And Maya wants to tell her that it's perfectly okay—that she'd rather have her bouncing off of the walls leaving bits of sunshine in her wake, or in this instance, writing really sad, _really_ terrible poetry. She'd rather that than whatever this is. 

The pair sit on Riley’s bed in her room on the second floor of the ski lodge, the open window blowing in the dense smell of nature; fallen leaves, brisk air, and burning wood. 

“Eventually, you’ll see that this is for the best.” The brunette says with a shrug. 

“Yeah? Well, I don’t know how I possibly ever could when you’ve done such a good job of making everything about a billion times more complicated than it needs to be.” 

Maya runs an exasperated hand through her hair, strands of it frizzing away from her head, like she’s been pulling them hard through her fingers for hours instead of ten minutes. 

Ever since the girls escaped up the stairs, Maya hasn’t stopped re-playing their last encounter with Lucas in her head. If you can even call it that.

_He got to his feet as Riley excused herself and Maya, whose throat still felt cracked and dry in all the wrong places, and looked between them. _

_Then, they all kind of just looked at each other. _

_“We should… yeah.” Maya said after clearing her throat a couple times. _

_“Yeah... “ Lucas responded, hands shoved deeply in his pockets as his bright eyes landed on hers. _

_He attempted a smile, and she stiffly went to return it, an air of unfinished business drifting between them, and as much as Maya dreaded it, that didn't stop a small spark from lighting in her stomach. That is, until it seemed to register with Lucas that he’d been looking at maya for far too long, and his gaze instantly switched to Riley instead. _

_And if that didn’t bring an unpleasant taste of deja vu rolling down her tongue... _

_Anyway, Riley beamed back, grabbed Maya’s arm, and practically dragged her up the stairs before the pot could boil over anymore than it already had._

“Maya, you like Lucas and Lucas likes you. How could this be a bad thing? Maybe if you talked to him…” 

At this, Maya loses all her chill, grabbing her best friend by her lunatic shoulders and pressing her face real close. Riley stares back, brown eyes wide.

“Riley. If you don't stop the words coming out of your face hole right now, I'm gonna have you committed into a mental institution.” Maya says slowly.

“Maya,” Riley responds just as slowly, gazing directly into her best friend’s eyes. “If being crazy is what makes me a good friend, then so be it.”

Maya is appalled by how well Riley hides the sadness in her eyes. Almost to the point where it’s not even there. She marvels at this, wonders when the brunette grew to be so strong.

Before she can fully get a grasp on it, her best friend breaks out of her hold and scoots back, leaning stubbornly against the headboard of her nature themed bed.

Maya remains at the edge, defeated as they watch each other.

She'll bet her left foot that the world stops turning by the end of this trip.


	4. Ski Lodge Part 3

The trip doesn’t actually drag by as slowly as Maya thought. Mostly because she spends her every waking moment avoiding Lucas at all costs and circumventing her friends when they ask her what went down between them. 

Eventually, Farkle, Zay and Smackle learn to approach her with caution, and only to ask her if she wants to go on nature-inspired activities with them. 

To which her answer is always no. 

The last day arrives relatively quickly this way as she splits her time between keeping Riley company at the bay window away from home, and being theatrically interested every time she bumps into Josh. She almost can’t believe that the weekend has gone by without any more natural disasters.

That is, until she leaves her room on Sunday morning only to find Lucas in the hallway, leaning up against the very ugly leaf-patterned wallpaper. 

In the moment that his eyes flicker up to meet hers, the disaster that is her life starts making sense again.

“We should probably talk.” Lucas says, only making matters worse, just like a Huckleberry would. 

Maya sighs. 

“_Why_ didn’t I predict this?” She wonders, looking upward to whatever higher power that clearly doesn’t have her in their good graces.

“What? Me wanting to work things out? I don’t know, Maya, maybe you don’t know me as well as you think you do.” He says, shrugging with his hands in his jean pockets.

Maya eyes him suspiciously and crosses her arms over her chest. 

“No," Maya says, "I just didn’t think you’d be this stupid to ignore all the signs pointing towards danger with big red arrows.”

He shakes his head and takes a step forward, the first hint of a smile teasing his mouth.

“You’re not dangerous, Maya.”

“You might not think that in a second.”

He responds by rolling his eyes. 

”I’m warning you.” 

“Give me your worst. I’m sure it’s nothing I haven’t handled before.” 

“What do you want, Lucas?” 

And just like that, the smile slides right off his face. It’s funny how she’s managed to make the sound of his own name have that effect. Or maybe it’s not funny at all. 

“I wanna talk to you, Maya. I mean really talk, not just the brief, snide comments you’ve been giving me the last few weeks.” 

“That’s how I always talk to you.” Maya contends with a shrug, pretending to be unfazed. 

“Oh really?” 

“Really.” She replies. “And anything else has just been because I didn’t want to—“ 

Lucas’ eyebrows draw together and he searches her eyes as she abruptly cuts herself off. 

”Didn’t want to... what?” He inquires. 

The blonde swipes a hand through her hair, put out by this whole situation. 

”I didn’t want to step on Riley’s toes. Okay?”

“Maya—“ 

“No. _Riley_ did this, not me. I didn't have anything to do with it. If anything it’s her you should be talking to.” She says, still firmly planted against her door jamb. 

“You don’t think I’ve thought about that?” He asks, striding forward to stand right in front of her. “'Cause I have. But then I realized that what needs to be resolved is between you and me. In a lot of ways, this really has nothing to do with Riley.”

“This has _everything_ to do with Riley—” 

“Maya, how do you feel about me?” 

Maya stops short, breathing and all. 

“What?” 

She can't think of a single worse thing than this; Lucas gazing into her eyes with an amount of sincerity that only he could manage, dark blue eyes pulling her in like it's night time and the full moon is peaking out of the clouds.

“You heard me.” Lucas murmurs, not backing down. 

“Why are you asking me that?” She breathes.

“Because it’s important. Because I’m tired of you pretending like it’s not. Because what you feel matters to me, Maya. Riley aside. Triangle aside. Do you still have feelings for me?” 

She gets stuck on the word _still_.

Words murmured into a campfire come rushing back.

“_Of course I like you.”_

It’s as if, after all this time, Lucas never allowed himself to believe that it wasn’t true. That it had all been a lie. And in the moment, as Lucas stares down at her and she gazes helplessly back, she can’t manage to say what she probably should. She physically can’t.

As much as she loathes it, there’s just something about Lucas that makes her heart ache. And she can continue to ignore it, pass it off as low self esteem or annoyance, but that’s never been it. What it really means is that she sees something in Lucas that she admires, that makes the world shine brighter, that makes bad things better. That makes her feel chosen and special in her ability to take him down a peg despite the fact that she doesn’t think there’s ever been a person more in awe of him than her.

Not that she’s in the business of being saved, by a stubborn cowboy no less. Except, in moments like this, he's not a cowboy at all—he's just a boy standing in front of a girl that... he might just have feelings for. It’s ridiculous and it makes her heart ache, but it’s what she sees in the rolled up sleeves of his red flannel and the fact that he keeps clenching and unclenching his hands, and the shade of his hair during this time of year and the building fear in his eyes...

“Yes.”

She’s not expecting anything catastrophic from it. She just thinks he deserves to hear it and that she deserves to be able to say it. After everything. But by the way that he tilts his head down, she thinks he might make something catastrophic out of it.

”Lucas, what—“

Halfway to her lips, Lucas pauses and sighs.

”Would you stop calling me Lucas?”

Somewhat breathless, Maya has to blink a few times before she can respond.

“I thought you liked it when I called you Lucas.” 

”Only when it’s special.”

”It never isn’t.”

”I might kiss you.”

Her heart stutters.

”Might, Huckleberry?” She says coolly, trying to save face and maybe cling onto the last string of dignity that she has left.

”I haven’t decided if it’s a good idea or not.” He says back, possibly flirting now.

”Well, if that’s the case, then we’re gonna be here all day. Cause I can think of at least five reasons why it’s not.”

”I was only thinking one—will Maya punch me in the face if I do this?”

A beat passes where all she does is breath, the question doing a tap dance in her head. The answer seems so obvious, like it’s written in big, block letters but also in a different language.

”I guess you’re just going to have to decide if that risk is worth taking.”

And according to Huckleberry, it is.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!! I know I had fun writing


End file.
